MIT Professor Lied About Chinese Government Ties: Feds

CAMBRIDGE, MA — An MIT professor was arrested Thursday and accused of failing to disclose his ties to the Chinese government while applying for federal grants.

Gang Chen, 56, a Chinese-born mechanical engineer and nanotechnologist, defrauded the U.S. Department of Energy and failed to disclose a China-based bank account on his taxes, according to federal prosecutors.

"No, it's not illegal to collaborate with foreign funders, it's illegal to lie about it," Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Andrew Lelling told reporters Thursday. "The government has a right to know whether its research dollars public tax dollars are funding research by people who are also receiving substantial sums from a foreign power."

Chen is the second Massachusetts professor in recent months to be accused of fraud and hiding financial connections to China.

Chen is a tenured professor and the Carl Richard Soderberg professor of power engineering at MIT. He is the director of the Pappalardo Micro and Nano Engineering Laboratories and works at the Solid-State Solar-Thermal Energy Conversion Center.

"He is an expert in nanotechnology," Lelling said, adding that he thought it was no coincidence the Chinese government in 2013 publically identified nanotechnology as a priority.

"Chen not only hid the extent of his own affiliations with the Chinese government but actively worked to further the goals of the Chinese government while employed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology," Lelling said.

Since 2012, Chen has held various appointments with the Chinese government to promote China's technological and scientific development by providing advice and expertise — sometimes directly to Chinese government officials — and often in exchange for financial compensation, according to prosecutors. He was an “overseas expert” for the Chinese government at the request of the Chinese Consulate in New York and a member of Chinese talent programs to recruit people for government jobs, prosecutors said.

Joseph Bonavolonta, special agent in charge of the FBI's Boston Division, said Chen recruited MIT students for the Chinese talent programs.

Bonavolonta said Chen has received $19 million in U.S. federal grants since 2013 but likely would not have received the grants if he had been honest in his applications and listed his Chinese bank account. Prosecutors said he received $29 million in foreign funding, which was never disclosed to MIT or the U.S. government.

Lelling wouldn't say if Chen passed sensitive information to the Chinese government, when asked.

"The charges in the case are not about the transfer of sensitive information, it's about fraud and the tax charges," said Lelling.

The complaint affidavit does not go into whether sensitive information was shared, he said.

The arrest comes as Lelling's department has seen an uptick in similar cases where China is involved.

In June, Harvard University professor and nanoscientist Charles Lieber was accused of failing to disclose income from a Chinese university to the U.S. government.

Lelling said the Chinese government has a strategy in which it fosters research collaborations internationally by "lavishly funding" the work of scientists.